“By this tie, you are bound,” Eric says, and the cave gets darker. “By this tie, you, Alana, swear not to harm Colchester, or stop his sacrifice.”

The cord begins to feel hot on her skin. Alana can feel it digging in, tighter than it should be.

“Nor will you, Colchester, harm this mother standing before you, or raise a hand against her child.”

The cord begins to smoke. Alana can feel the burning heat all the way down to the bone.

“By this tie, you both swear.”

“I swear,” Colchester says.

Then he — and Eric — nod at Alana.

“I swear,” she says, hating it.

The cord bursts into flames, twisting and turning. Alana’s skin blackens beneath it, as does the boy’s.

Colchester keeps grinning. Alana grimaces. She can take the pain.

The cord smolders to ash and falls from their wrists. All that’s left are the charred marks on their flesh.

Colchester nods at her, pulling his Gymboree long-sleeve tee over the blackened skin.

“Pleasure doing business with you,” he says. “You will be reunited with your daughter tomorrow night.”

He walks back into the shadows of the cave before he vanishes into the dark. Then she and Eric are alone again.

“Alana,” he says.

“Save it.” She turns toward the mouth of the cave and walks toward the light.

Her wrist throbs with pain with every step. She imagines killing Colchester, taking the small body and smashing it against the wall of the cave, bashing its brains out —

And the pain in her wrist grows exponentially worse. She looks down and sees the blistered wound glowing red, as if it’s still burning.

So that answers that.

Alana knows Colchester means to keep her from stopping whatever he has planned. He thinks she’s compromised her honor. He thinks she’s writhing inside at all of this. That he’s won, that he’s humbled and humiliated her. He probably thinks she’s plotting at this moment how to get around the deal, to save Middleton and stop him.

This is how she knows Colchester, in all his long life, never had children. Except as a snack, obviously.

If he had, he know she doesn’t care about any of that other crap at this moment. She will do whatever it takes to get Grace back. She was not lying about that.

To get her daughter back, she would let everything burn.

INTERLUDE: Trapped in the Goblin’s Lair

INTERLUDE

Trapped in the Goblin’s Lair

MIDDLETON. THEN.

Crime-scene tape wrapped the front porch of the Petersons’ home like ribbon on a gift. A police car sat in the street with an officer inside, watching the house. But Alana wouldn’t have gotten very far in her career if she couldn’t slide past the Middleton cops.